Andy is the CEO and cofounder of Stoke Space, a startup that aims to build 100% reusable rockets. The startup raised a $9.1M seed round in 2020, graduated from Y Combinator's Winter 2021 batch, and then announced a $65M Series A in December. All the while, Stoke has been moving quickly to build a completely new kind of rocket.

Today’s episode is sponsored by Spaced Ventures, which recently launched an effort to open an investment round into SpaceX. The space investment portal has received over $38M million in pledges from 2,150+ investors. Find out more at https://www.spacedventures.com/

CHAPTERS

01:57 — Andy's resume, from Cornell to Blue Origin and beyond
06:54 — Leaving Blue and thinking through what's next
08:36 — Thesis, team, & track record
12:06 — An engineering challenge, not a science problem
15:52 — Escaping Earth's gravity well is no small feat
18:36 — $$$
22:18 — Analogy from the high seas and 200 years ago
24:02 — What Stoke is doing differently ... and @ 24:55 the unsolved problem
28:38 — The most novel part to Stoke's approach
33:24 — Speed, vertical integration, and tightly coupled systems
37:21 — The test stand in Moses Lake, Washington
39:44 — Fundraising, from the seed round to a $65M Series A
40:15 — Sustainability
52:45 — Testing + developing a reusable second stage
1:00:49 — Stoke in a post-Starship world
1:04:05 — Who will the customers be?

SHOW NOTES

Stoke Space’s website: https://www.stokespace.com/
Stoke Space’s Twitter: https://twitter.com/stoke_space
Andy’s Twitter: https://twitter.com/AndyLapsa
Ryan’s Twitter: https://twitter.com/Ryandoofy
Payload’s Stoke Space coverage: https://payloadspace.com/stoke-series-a/

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Andy Lapsa on 100% Reusable Rockets

Valley of Depth